A Tale of Two Brothers
by paperbkryter
Summary: Sam needs saving, and Dean, of course, is there for him. Just a little interlude between current episodes.


There was a line from _A Tale of Two Cities..._

"_It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." _

It was an appropriate description, he thought, of his life at the moment.

By the light of day, when the sun was shining bright and the air smelled fresh and clean, when there was nothing but open road ahead – those were the good times. Just that morning they'd stopped at a roadside produce stand. Breakfast was fresh fruit. Their table had been the Impala's broad hood. The broad canopy of a tree shaded them from the rising sun, and the wind rustling through its leaves was their musical accompaniment. The sound of the wind was sweet relief to Sam's ears after a night of listening to AC/DC and his brother's warbling voice.

At the time they'd had no where to go, and were in no hurry to get there. After breakfast Sam sprawled out in the grass to soak up some sun. Dean kicked off his boots, rolled up his jeans, and splashed around in a nearby stream as if he were a kid again.

Again. As if they'd ever been allowed to lounge around in the sunshine and splash in creeks like other kids did. Sam didn't think his nearly thirty-year-old brother skipping stones and playing in the water was silly at all. If either of them deserved to revisit childhood, it was Dean. Saddled with the responsibility of an infant brother at the age of four, when had he ever been able to be a kid?

_I'm sorry. It's all my fault. It came for me..._

It was the worst of times when he thought about stuff that - like how abnormal their upbringing had been, how warped they'd become, and how it all went wrong in the first place. It was hard not to blame himself when darkness fell and all he could see was Jessica's pale face, and how the light no longer lit up her eyes. They stared down at him from among the flames all dark and lifeless. Was that what his father had seen on _that_ night? Had Mary Winchester's dead eyes haunted him forever?

Were they still?

Sam wasn't stupid. He knew what saving Dean's life had cost their father. He wasn't stupid, and he wasn't _normal_ either. His clairvoyance allowed him to see things he sometimes didn't want to see, know things he didn't want to know. If he sat back and _looked_, he could see his father, and sometimes get a little taste of John's torture. It came to him in his nightmares. He'd wake shouting, screaming. Sometimes Dean gave him shit for waking him up. Sometimes Dean fussed over him like a mother hen.

"_Sammy, are you okay?"_

He put on a game face, and tried not to sleep at all. It wasn't hard. He figured it had been nearly two years since he'd had a decent nights sleep. The nightmares began long before Jessica's death. It seemed like he always had a headache anymore. The pain alone kept him from sleeping more than a couple hours at a time. He'd wake and begin pacing. He'd watch television, or surf the net while listening to music through his headphones. Reading was nearly impossible. The small print made his head throb, and the silence was disconcerting. In the silence he could hear the voices more clearly. Sam couldn't always make out what they were saying, but when he could...

They were slowly driving him toward a frightening destiny.

Dean had done much in the way of confessing lately. Guilt and grief, loneliness and despair had come pouring out on more than one occasion. It had been hard for him, but he needed to let go a little. _Sam_ needed him to let go. He had had picked at Dean's shell mercilessly hoping it would distract him from his own torment. He knew eventually Dean would crack. Beneath his hard shell was a heart of mush. Sam could help him heal.

Persistence finally revealed the pain Dean had been hiding since their father's death, and the burdens he carried. Sam had been startled not only by the revelations regarding himself, but by the depth of his brother's agony. It was crushing the spirit from him. Sam's once good intentions crumbled and died. He had nothing to offer. Dean would be on his own.

Sam had his own burdens, and where once he might have shared everything, he now held back. Dean pretended to be oblivious, maybe he was oblivious, Sam didn't know. In any case he never tried to wring any confessions out of Sam and Sam's secrets remained his own.

It was probably better that way.

In the dark, late at night, when the television was turned down low and shadows crept in along the edges of their room – those were certainly the worst of times. The voices were at their loudest in the dark. Sam constantly felt as if he were being watched, and frequently he _was _being watched. He could sense the "life" lurking outside in the midnight shadows. Only he could hear the scratch of nails on the door and at the window. If he closed his eyes the door into Hell opened wide and he could see, hear, touch and taste...

The scents of sulfur and old blood sickened him. The screaming never stopped.

This night had been particularly bad.

It was nearly dawn. He'd been pacing for hours. He was exhausted but dared not lay down. Envy gnawed at him every time he passed by the foot of the bed where Dean lay in a spread-eagled sprawl across the mattress. Sam paused to look at him. Eyes closed, mouth half open, Dean snored softly. He still wore his watch, and his pendant lay cradled in the hollow of his bare chest. A pair of thin, barely-there scars arced across his torso, both stopping abruptly where the talisman lay snarling out at Sam. It had spared Dean from an instantaneous death during the demon's attack. Sam wondered if he even realized it.

The pendant's cord was looking a bit frayed. Sam made a mental note to mention it later.

The talisman rose and fell with Dean's every breath.

Some time around two a.m. Sam had slipped outside and retrieved a knife from the Impala's trunk. He didn't remember doing it. The weapon sat on the table by the door, unsheathed and very sharp.

Dean's chest rose.

And fell.

Rose.

And fell.

_A finger slides beneath frayed leather cord. A flip of the wrist and the artifact is tossed aside. _

_The tip of a knife coaxes out one glistening drop of blood from beneath pale skin. _

_Eyes open. Startled. Afraid._

"_Sam?"_

Sam pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead and resumed his pacing. He stumbled a little when another vision struck him hard, stopped dead in his tracks when the pain nailed him full force only a second later. The taste of blood filled his mouth. He'd bitten his lip in an effort to keep quiet.

_A woman screams. A maid, she's a maid. _

He fell to his knees, clutching his temples. The colors hurt him.

_Crimson sheets. Liquid red. Yellow sunlight. Silver steel. Green eyes. _

_Dead eyes. _

_Little scarlet lemmings leap from dangling fingers into a dark blue sea of carpet..._

_Pit._

_Pat._

_Pit._

_Pat. _

_The fingers slowly curl. The arm stiffens. _

_Death is ugly. _

"No. God...Dean..."

The voice was his father's, but Sam knew better than to believe it was John himself.

"_If you do it quickly he won't wake up."_

"Shut up," Sam whispered. He slowly levered himself up from the floor. Dark spots and bright auras temporarily blinded him. Somewhat unsteadily, he wiped the sweat from his brow with a swipe of his arm. His head felt like it was going to explode.

"_He won't feel anything. In fact, it may be more merciful. Spare him what's to come."_

Sam ground his teeth. "I said. Shut. Up."

There was half a bottle of flat beer sitting on the bathroom counter. He made his way toward it. His hand shook as he drank it down along with a couple of Aspirin dug out from the depths of his pocket. The death visions were getting stronger, clearer, the subject matter more disturbing, and so far he'd kept the truth of them at bay. But how long would it be, he wondered, before he could no longer fight it? How long would it be before he made the visions his reality?

"_Soon, Sammy. Soon."_

"No."

A sound caught his attention, startled him. A shadow stretched across the ceiling, lightning flickered, and Sam's body tensed as if bracing for an attack.

No attack came. The sound had only been Dean's sigh. The shadow had been Dean's shadow as he'd rolled over in his sleep. The lightning flash was nothing more than lamplight reflecting off the face of Dean's watch. Sam let his brother settle before moving back toward the foot of the bed. He stood there for a long time. Dean didn't stir again. He slept on, unaware of the war Sam waged without him.

Sam finally pulled up a chair beside the bed. He slumped down into it, exhaustion dragging at every limb. Leaning forward he rested his arms upon the mattress and his head upon his arms. He could feel the nightmares lurking in the dark recesses of his mind. His strength was wavering. It would be impossible to keep Hell at bay if he let go and closed his eyes, but he had to sleep. He had to sleep.

It was pure instinct that drove him to sit beside Dean's bed. Had he not been convinced Dean would kill him, he might have crawled into it as he'd often done as a child.

"_Whassamatter Sammy?"_

"_Scared."_

"_Huh?"_

"_Had a bad dream. Ken I sleep with you?"_

"_Sam-eee..."_

"_Please?"_

Dean had grumbled, Dean had whined, but he'd never said no, had never said, _"Go away, sleep in your own bed." _

No, Dean had always rolled over and made room. Having his brother's warm bulk at his back had been a rare comfort. Sam never had the luxury of being cuddled and coddled by his mother. His father and brother did the best they could, but were no substitution. From the moment he began to walk physical contact with another human being became rare. John's affections never went beyond a firm squeeze or ruffled hair. Dean was more likely to hand out a hug, but only in a dire emergency wherein Sam cried really, really hard. He never knew a mother's touch. The closest thing to a mother Sam ever got was a skinny kid in sneakers who hugged a little too tightly and whispered _"shut up ya baby"_ with breath that smelled like bubble gum.

Sam's fingers traveled across the blanket, closer to where Dean slept. His hand curled, fingers folding into his palm. His knuckles barely brushed the point of Dean's elbow, but in just that tenuous touch, he found what he needed.

The voices stopped. The visions faded. The door slammed shut on the screams of the damned.

He was asleep within seconds.

Sam never saw his brother's head rise from the bed. He was oblivious to the wary glance Dean made toward the knife, and the soft sigh that followed. The hand that came to rest upon his shoulder didn't wake him, but instead only deepened his slumber.

Dean returned his head to his pillow. His mumbled words were meant to be reassuring, as they had when he'd first said them twenty-three years earlier.

"It's okay, Sammy."

* * *

"_It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way..."_ **- Charles Dickens, _A Tale of Two Cities_**


End file.
